Sequels are fun. They’re not always good, but the movie-loving teenager who continues to take up space inside my soul will always be excited by them, especially the mere concept of sequels, i.e. “more of what you love (if all goes well).” These days, when it does go well, like with last summer’s Live Free or Die Hard, it’s a nice surprise. When it doesn’t, like with 2002’s Men in Black II, you almost forget what you liked so much the first time around.
This summer there will be a new Indiana Jones sequel in theaters: Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull. It’s a big deal in the world of sequels, seeing as how there hasn’t been a new entry in this series since 1989’s Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade. Expectations are high for some fans, who might have preferred that Steven Spielberg, George Lucas, and Harrison Ford had stopped after three films, but the Indiana Jones series was never structured as a trilogy like the two sets of Star Wars movies. Nothing was resolved in Last Crusade that was first brought up in 1981’s Raiders of the Lost Ark, except for the deaths of more Nazis.
You know what my niece’s first word was? “Dada.” No, she wasn’t referring to the early-20th-century art movement that generated nothing of value except for a fluke hit single by the Police in the 1980s, if I remember my history correctly. She was referring to her father. You know, like “daddy.” But she didn’t say “daddy.” She said “dada.”